Easter Birthday

Today is Easter Sunday, the earliest Easter Sunday since 1913. Today is also my sixtieth birthday. The next time that Easter falls on March 23rd will be in the year 2228, my 280th birthday - and I am expecting a party!

Apparently Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon of spring. The earliest possible Easter is March 22nd, and those are the rarest of all.

I was born in 1948 and am a true baby-boomer. My father served in England and France during World War II where he received a Purple Heart after being hit in the arm with a rocket. He was part of the Army Air Corps, the precursor to the Air Force. My mother worked at a munitions plant in Parsons, Kansas, during the war - a true "Rosie the Riveter." Dad and his cousin, Dalton Macy, were operating a taxi in Neosho, MO, after the war when they met a couple of Sreaves girls. Dalton married Betty and my Dad married Florine. They are all gone now, except for my Dad who still lives on his own in a very big house in Noel, MO. He told me recently that he certainly never suspected that he would live to see me turn sixty.

There are two major zodiac charts in use around the world, a solar zodiac and a lunar zodiac. The solar aodiac is the one with which most of us are familiar. It is twelve sun signs that begin with Aries the Ram and works its way through to Pisces the Fish. Each sign is dominant for about thirty days each year.
The lunar zodiac, more commonly thought of as the Chinese calendar, is based on animals and runs a full year. The first sign is the Rat and the chart concludes at the end of twelve years with the Pig.

Interestingly enough, I was born an Aries in the year of the Rat, the first position on both charts. I'm not sure what that means, but there is only a very small window when that can happen - during one thirty-day period every twelve years.

Today I had telephone calls from all of my children and grandchildren. My sister called and sang "Happy Birthday" to me, and I also got to visit with my neice, Tiffany, on that call. Late this evening my niece, Heidi, called, also with birthday wishes. My good friend, Imogene Knaust, called from Pierce City, MO, to wish me the best, and my friend, Andy Cleeton, sent a handmade card.

It has been a very good day. It has been a very good sixty years!